Many searches are based on context. A person who searches for “restaurant” might want to know about restaurants generally, but more likely the person is looking for a nearby restaurant. In this example, the context associated with the search is the location in which the search is being performed. While a person can perform any type of contextual search, people tend to search recurrently for the same things, in predictable patterns. For example, a person who likes Chinese restaurants is likely to search for Chinese restaurants frequently. If the person is registered with an online service and has given appropriate permission for his searches and other behaviors to be mined, then the service might deduce the person's affinity for Chinese restaurants and might assign a virtual “Chinese restaurant” badge to that person as a way of designating the person's affinity.
A badge (or another type of expression of a person's affinities and interests) can be used in various ways—e.g., as a method of promoting social cohesion among like-minded people in an online setting. However, there are other ways in which a badge can be used.